THE RULING: Kids wearing American flag T-shirts in school can be forced to take them off, because Mexican students threatened to beat them up if they didn’t. Meanwhile, kids wearing Mexican flag T-shirts are allowed to keep them on. Why? Because, silly! Nobody threatened to beat them up!

I’m not making it up:

[O]n Cinco de Mayo 2010, a group of Caucasian students, including the students bringing this appeal, wore American flag shirts to school. A female student approached M.D. that morning, motioned to his shirt, and asked, “Why are you wearing that? Do you not like Mexicans[?]” D.G. and D.M. were also confronted about their clothing before “brunch break.”

*6 As Rodriguez was leaving his office before brunch break, a Caucasian student approached him, and said, “You may want to go out to the quad area. There might be some—there might be some issues.” During the break, another student called Rodriguez over to a group of Mexican students, said that she was concerned about a group of students wearing the American flag, and said that “there might be problems.” Rodriguez understood her to mean that there might be a physical altercation. A group of Mexican students asked Rodriguez why the Caucasian students “get to wear their flag out when we [sic] don’t get to wear our [sic] flag?”

Boden directed Rodriguez to have the students either turn their shirts inside out or take them off. The students refused to do so.

. . . .

The students’ equal protection claim is a variation of their First Amendment challenge. Cf. U.S. CONST. amend. XIV, § 1 (stating that “[n]o State shall . . . deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws”). They allege that they were treated differently than students wearing the colors of the Mexican flag, and that their speech was suppressed because their viewpoint was disfavored. . . . As the district court noted, the students offered no evidence “demonstrating that students wearing the colors of the Mexican flag were targeted for violence.” The students offered no evidence that students at a similar risk of danger were treated differently, and therefore no evidence of impermissible viewpoint discrimination.

Thus, the thugs gets to dictate who gets freedom of expression — and the federal court says that is A-OK.

You can profess (or actually experience) shock, but in reality, this is nothing new. In a world where media outlets routinely permit depictions of Jesus but fuzz out depictions of the prophet Mohammed (remember that South Park episode?), we already knew the operative principle: the people who threaten violence get to squelch speech, while the people who don’t . . . don’t.

While infurating, it’s also (if you think about it) actually bracing to have a federal appeals court announce the rule that only those who threaten violence get their way. Why? Because it reinforces the lesson: you can’t count on federal courts to protect your rights — even vaunted First Amendment rights. Even the most ridiculous, laughable proposition can become Sacred Law if you can get a majority of twits in black robes to vote for it. Mark Twain is credited with saying: “No man’s life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session.” The same is true of the courts.

Were you folks doubting my sincerity when I said I have given up on this country? Truly, I have.

85 Responses to “Federal Court: Kids Wearing American Flag T-Shirts Must Take Them Off, Because People Threatened to Beat Them Up If They Didn’t”

Part of me thinks this could happen in any school or court in America, but I’m holding out hope this is a Ninth Circuit and California phenomenon. It really would be the end of our country if this is what passes for political or legal intelligence.

I too have professed my readiness to just let it all go down hill without anymore fight. I get all sorts of flack about it.

My rejoinder is that it may get worse faster but then it was always going to get worse. So let’s have that result, let’s show all these people who think they can do these things without impunity. Without causing major clashes and further chaos by entertaining these ridiculous positions in the face of the facts and long practice guided by past experience.

Let’s spend trillions we don’t have, let’s make and try to enforce laws that make no sense or are at odds with peoples inner inclinations. Let’s discriminate against people in the name of anti-discrimination. Let’s let some groups have more rights than other groups all in the name of equality. Let’s disavow the plain language of the constitution for the convoluted and bizarre twisted logic of political correctness. Let’s continue to tear down the institutions and the patriarchs that supported and built American culture. A culture which has been the richest, freest most positive towards life and liberty than any other nation or state in the world’s history.

Let’s defy logic and sound policy and go full on liberal/progressive and when it all falls apart, then and only then will we have a chance to show those too ignorant or self interested to pay attention to what was happening in the country because of the results of doing things contrary to wise advice and ignoring common sense and the constitution.

Let’s defy logic and sound policy and go full on liberal/progressive and when it all falls apart, then and only then will we have a chance to show those too ignorant or self interested to pay attention to what was happening in the country because of the results of doing things contrary to wise advice and ignoring common sense and the constitution.

How about fighting the leftists? Lefitsts are enemies of all humanity.

When the US military, no less, is berserk with enough idiotic political correctness to sink a battleship — coddling Nidal-Hasan and GLBT type misfits, while giving little to no leeway to army chaplains — the situation with the public school in Morgan Hill seems almost quaint in comparison.

The only thing that will make me less POed is if students wearing shirts displaying the flag of Mexico during, say, celebrations associated with “Caucasians” also had been asked by school officials in the past to remove or conceal them.

The very fact the court ruling uses the word “Caucasian” in the context of conflicts involving people of Latino background already gives a rather dumb, goofball layer to the whole case.

Well, at least the person occupying the White House in 2014 — who’s sort of a symbol of the US at this moment in time — is an exemplary, beautiful, wonderful, sensible, trustworthy human being.

Clearly, American parents (of whatever racial or ethnic background) should keep their kids home on May 5th for safety reasons.

That would be an interesting outcome. “Caucasian” parents (to use the court’s language) could just say: hey, whereas the school insists upon holding a Cinco de Mayo celebration and whereas they profess to be unable to protect Caucasian students on this day, we are going to keep our children from school. Let the school district be half empty and lose state funding on that day.

Were you folks doubting my sincerity when I said I have given up on this country? Truly, I have.

You have grown.

P.S. The nation isn’t sacrosanct. New nations can emerge. Perhaps even one day a nation-less order in a given region. Although I’m hardly convinced of that, I do like to hear the anarcho-capitalists dream.

P.P.S. There are worse things in the world than the collapse of something bad. Just because it’s bad now doesn’t mean it was always bad, but if you concede that, you ought to concede that just because it was good before doesn’t mean it is good now.

In a world where media outlets routinely permit depictions of Jesus but fuzz out depictions of the prophet Mohammed

And whose liberal borg continues to treat, for example, the Boy Scouts of America — already weak-kneed from the lunacy of political correctness rum amok — not too differently from the extremists who say the BSA still hasn’t gone far enough. After all, if it’s good enough for the Catholic hierarchy, why isn’t it good enough for the Boy Scouts of America?

BTW, Patterico, etc, the emotions that do make you feel nice-nice about the idea of same-sex marriage really aren’t that far removed from the biases and emotions behind this particular court decision or, for that matter, decisions made by a major American corporation originally identified with wholesomeness.

If we’ve met the enemy, he is us.

washingtontimes.com, February 27, 2014: Walt Disney World has decided to drop a Florida Boy Scouts council as a recognized charity for its employees, according to a Scouting memo posted on a gay-friendly website. The policy change, announced months after the national scouting organization said it would accept openly gay Scouts but preserve a ban on gay adult leaders, means Walt Disney World will not recognize the volunteer hours its 60,000-plus employees give the Central Florida Council of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA).

The corporate giant — whose Orlando park is a major destination for “Gay Day” events in early June — will also no longer offer the council or its units grant funding, apparently a signal that the BSA decision, by keeping the adult ban, did not go far enough.

While the BSA voted in 2013 to permit openly gay youth to be part of Scouts, it retained its ban on homosexual adults as employees, leaders and volunteers.

Scouts for Equality said that seven major corporate sponsors of BSA “have ended their partnerships” with the BSA since 2012, including Lockheed Martin, Caterpillar, Major League Soccer, Merck, Intel and UPS.

I can answer if you want. Ironically, I don’t want it to happen, really. But I think it’s possible.

A lot of the changes America is going through are as a result of demographic changes. Those who insist, as do most Republicans and libertarians, that ideology is the main glue of nations are dreaming. Pat Buchanan, Peter Bigelow, etc., are right — even though they are incredibly unpopular — and I clearly don’t share their religious views. But in any case, many non-religious people see it that way too.

So as the character of the nation changes as immigration and resulting domestic births alter the country, this will lead to regional differences, many of which of course already list.

Many smart people I know want the country to break up under those lines arguing, not without evidence, that there is less conflict and strife in more homogeneous regions. I do’t really favor this, as I like diversity (despite the real problems that come from it), but it’s far from unlikely.

I mean, don’t many Mexicans, Mexican immigrants, and Mexican-Americans, for example, talk about this openly?

Borders change, right? Their borders were hardly sacrosanct, as Santa Ana and others discovered. There is no reason to think that, despite massive demographic changes, the US’s present geograghic constitution is inviolable.

If and when there is change in this regard, there will be emigration to regions that suit one ideologically and demographically, and competition between the regions. Not all the effects of such a change would be bad.

Alternatively, Caucasians can simply accept a social and legal order where as they decline in others, they can be asymmetrically threatened with combinations of violence and guilt with impunity and unstoppable inevitably.

A lot of the changes America is going through are as a result of demographic changes. Those who insist, as do most Republicans and libertarians, that ideology is the main glue of nations are dreaming.

Nonetheless, it’s fascinating to me that a nation in the American continent made up of people of mainly (ie, over 95-plus percent) European extraction, referring to Argentina, in some ways is as socially (eg, levels of crime) and economically (ie, banana-republic financial conditions) messed up as nations long associated with non-Euro-based societies, including the Third World.

Because I see just how corrupting liberal biases are in humans, now more than ever before when I think of people and want to rate and categorize them, I think along ideological lines (ie, whether they’re of the left, center or right), and not the lines of race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, sexuality or religion.

I’d be curious what the rates of admixture are in Argentina, but of course you’re correct that genetic diversity is only one factor.

But even the most ardent culturalist ought to concede that when these ethnic groups self-identify as primarily belonging to their ethnicity and the shrinking majority in the country let these groups determine laws through violent threat, that that is a significant development.

when these ethnic groups self-identify as primarily belonging to their ethnicity and the shrinking majority in the country let these groups determine laws through violent threat, that that is a significant development.

Without question. But if you strip away the facade of race and ethnicity (or, for that matter — given the insanity of GLBT activism — sexuality), what you’ll find in most instances, at the core, is the lunacy of liberalism. Liberalism made far more perverse and corrupting in the 21st century than in the past.

For instance, left-leaning inclinations in the context of the US in the 1950s — against the backdrop of a still relatively stable, conforming culture — are far different from liberalism in the context of 2014.

We’re not just falling down the proverbial slippery slope, it seems like we’re also going down head first.

My Cinco de Mayo story is that I grew up in a community that was about 50% Mexican-American, and a little secret that the school district didn’t want people to know is that on May 5 so many students would be granted excused absences from school that the principal’s office wouldn’t even bother cross-checking the absent list against the list of excused absences (i.e. students whose parents had called in to have their kids excused). Thus, it was the one day that even Anglo kids could ditch school with no consequences.

Yes, but political ideology is not divorced from biology, even though most don’t or won’t see the connection. This is not a 1:1 correlation here. It’s just a factor.

But, as an example, one of my main critiques of libertarianism — a philosophy I am partial to — is that they never quite explain how a philosophy that predominantly appeals to somewhat, but not extremely, above-average IQ people, mostly white males, is going to have sustained mass-market appeal.

Perhaps their ideas are most just and noble, at least in a theoretical sense. But to expect peoples whose average IQs are one-half or one or one-and-a-half standard deviations below the mean to be hugely drawn to a philosophy based on individual competition in the market, as opposed to fairness and redistribution of wealth, seems far-fetched.

Also, the idea that one’s own political or economic ideology is The One True Way, and that to others don’t have any merit for circumstances one has not fully considered, strikes me as a bit suspect also.

Part of me thinks this could happen in any school or court in America, but I’m holding out hope this is a Ninth Circuit and California phenomenon. It really would be the end of our country if this is what passes for political or legal intelligence.

Comment by DRJ (a83b8b) — 2/27/2014 @ 6:02 pm

It’s California. They start the day with the National Anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance at my daughter’s school just like we did at mine 45 years ago.

Just next to Chicago, is Skokie where Illinois Nazis wanted to march one time. Skokie tried to stop them for their own protection — they would suffer violence. The Illinois Appellate Court in Cook County ruled that in that case, Skokie must protect them from the counter-demonstrators. The Court reasoned that thugs who threaten the free exercise of speech do not get the privilege of creating a First Amendment “clear and present danger” justifying the authorities’ restraint of that speech.

This was a money case, right? Not to enjoin prior restraint. Wherefore Tinker. Well … this coming May 5th, the students should organize, give notice to the school and the local police, and get a declaratory judgment and injunction that they can wear their flags and that the police have to protect them. Sometimes you have to put in a little work and take a little risk to keep your rights.

Well … this coming May 5th, the students should organize, give notice to the school and the local police, and get a declaratory judgment and injunction that they can wear their flags and that the police have to protect them.

It’s a great idea, nk, but of course these days when confronted with the racial grievance lobby we just curl up in a corner and hope that if we acquiesce to their every demand they will be nice to us and leave us alone. It’s like the whole kerfuffle at Dartmouth: everybody knows that the administration should tell the grievance-mongering kids to go pound sand, but everyone also knows there is no way in hell that the administration will do that.

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$100k and it includes the tractor.

They’re practically giving these things away.

Bet it goes through gas like nobody’s business. The truck and the boat.

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And, really, what would go better with that than a Mercury Marine 225 hp. outboard.

It’s a great idea, nk, but of course these days when confronted with the racial grievance lobby we just curl up in a corner and hope that if we acquiesce to their every demand they will be nice to us and leave us alone.

“Concerned Asian, Black, Latin@, Native, Undocumented, Queer, and Differently-Abled students” have threatened “physical action” if the administrators do not respond to their list of demands.

The number one concern when we had our daughter was that our she would go to a school where the other kids were like her. And it remains our main concern with the high school and with the college she will go to. Diversity! Blech!

We wanted a business school for our niece and looked at Kellogg. Well, she’s a “nerd”, in the nice sense of the term, a super-good student. Like our daughter is. At Kellogg, we were told, she would be with kids that were like her, who were there to learn. (In the end, she decided the business she was interested was the fashion industry and Rome would be better. Eh.)

You have to realize I’m a Reagan conservative as you read this. I think the school had a point that there was a serious threat of violence pending, and they needed to do something to mitigate it. However, I think the case should have considered an additional piece of evidence: the underlying events were 5-5-10; they should have considered what the school did on 5-5-11. On 5-5-11 there should have been NO observance of Cinco de Mayo, due to the threat of violence or disruption as illustrated the year before. If the school did have a Cinco de Mayo observance on 5-5-11, the court should have found for the students, as the school had shown a discriminatory approach to dealing with violence that invalidates the school’s defense against the students’ civil rights claims.

When you have the top leadership of the ostensible opposition party fluffing illegal aliens and pushing hard to let them and this Administration break the law to the detriment of the country, there is no balance of power to keep the courts in line. It is difficult to change the courts quickly, by design, but the Boehner/Cantor/Goodlatte/Ryan Amnesty shills can be booted out of their leadership positions quickly and decisively. The courts will get the message.

I don’t agree, as in it isn’t that simple, but less diversity = more social interaction, the research shows.

And social interaction is interesting.

But I still don’t agree. I just had an experience of a black man, who had angrily attacked me for being racist a year ago, and we had an honest discussion about that, said some nice things about me on FB a few moments ago. (The other day, he even posted something about genetic diversity in Polynesia, knowing I’m interested in the topic.)

At the time we first “met”, I didn’t change my position, but explained where I was coming from, and told him if he wants to be enemies, that’s his option, but certainly isn’t something I’d choose.

Anyway, he responded by adding me as a friend, and we’ve had several online discussions since then. We agree on a lot of things, hardly everything, and have both come to realize that each of us wants the best for the world, for each other, for each other’s loved ones, etc. Had good online talks with some of his friends, too. I find that they are more reasonable on these (anthropology) and related issues than are white liberals and conservatives who are either self-righteously or fear-based pretending to be absolute doctrinaire biological equalists.

Anyway, my point being that we’re all human beings. Whether our differences are 100% cultural and ideological or not, we are mammals. Why should we not enjoy each other’s company, differences, sameness, and so on?

Diversity is a fact of life, good or bad. Since the invention of the airplane rather makes increased diversity inevitable, we should learn how to live with it. That might mean some places become or remain enclaves for this group or that; it probably will more often mean an increasing melting pot. And it will cause some problems, as well as bring great experiences, opportunities, and relationships. I even agree one has to be practical and protect themselves from threatened violence by individuals from other groups who are motivated by racial, cultural, or nationalist hatred, as in the above example Patterico posted. Regrettable that people intimidate others this way, but no less real.

However, being a mixed-race individual who wouldn’t be alive without diversity, understanding that a certain amount of genetic diversity is important for the overall health of offspring and especially of populations, and knowing that differences between peoples mainly evolved precisely because they offered advantages under different circumstances, I know that to say that diversity offers no advantages at all just isn’t true.

Now, maybe there should be some regions that are more predominantly Chinese or Caucasian or African or Amerindian or whatever. Maybe there should be some that are increasingly diverse. However neither of those situations will be perfect. They’ll each have strengths and weaknesses.

At the end of the day, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s (and yes, I know a lot about his flaws and inconsistencies too) bit about judging people by the content of their character is about as good as I know to do. And I’ve known and loved too many people of different races, cultures, and countries to believe that diversity is always bad. It can be wonderful. I just think we should talk honestly about differences and commonalities, and not attack each other for doing so. I personally believe that will help.

Diversity of thought is good. Desirable and valuable. To be actively sought, included, encouraged and rewarded. Not to be passed through the digestive system of an institution, educational or otherwise, and converted into one amorphous, uniform, stinking mass.

Incidentally, a California statute, Cal. Educ. Code § 48950, seems to offer the flag-wearing students more protection than the First Amendment, under Tinker, provides:

(a) School districts operating one or more high schools … shall not make or enforce a rule subjecting a high school pupil to disciplinary sanctions solely on the basis of conduct that is speech or other communication that, when engaged in outside of the campus, is protected from governmental restriction by the First Amendment ….

(d) This section does not prohibit the imposition of discipline for harassment, threats, or intimidation, unless constitutionally protected ….

(f) The Legislature finds and declares that free speech rights are subject to reasonable time, place, and manner regulations.

The “time, place, and manner regulations” provision doesn’t apply here, because the restriction here was justified with reference to the content of the expression (and the supposed harm that it might cause). Time, place and manner regulations must be unrelated to content, and focused instead on matters such as noise, blockage of hallways and other effects of speech that don’t stem from the message that the speech communicates. But apparently § 48950 wasn’t brought up in the 9th Circuit litigation.

Volokh is now under he Washington Post, but the old website, and all the old links, are still there.

That link goes to a Eugene Volokh post of April 30, 2010 4:25 pm on the Harvard E-Mail Controversy. (where someone’s private e-mail, speculating on the possibility of racial differences in intelligence, a la “the Bell Curve” was made public.)

Here’s an idea! They are HIGH SCHOOL KIDS antagonizing each other maliciously! The parents and the school administrators should institute a dress code of plain white shirts and blue/black pants. I believe this was done a few years ago at another school that was having issues. If these kids aren’t mature enough to respect each others culture and/or differences, they shouldn’t have a choice. It is ridiculous that parents and the media are pandering to this immature kids.

Chicago did that district-wide for a time but then softened it to the discretion of individual schools. I don’t favor it. Uniformity of dress promotes uniformity of thought, which is desirable in soldiers, policemen and low-level employees but not optimal in an institution of learning.

Interestingly, I’ve been told by more than one person living here in CA who has emigrated from Mexico, that Cinco de Mayo is celebrated here far more than it was “at home”.
It would be like if we, Americans, held a national holiday commemorating the Battle of Saratoga.

I especially enjoyed how it was preceded by a comment by FC which attempted to argue in favor of this ersatz diversity, but in fact conceded all your points.

I always enjoyed calling bull**** in those Navy brainwashing sessions when we got around to “diversity is our strength.” You should have seen the jaws drop. How could anyone disagree with the group consensus? The diversity types could never conceive of anyone operating outside of groupthink.

The diversity mafia just didn’t know what to do with a non-conformist.

I especially enjoyed how it was preceded by a comment by FC which attempted to argue in favor of this ersatz diversity, but in fact conceded all your points.

I acknowledge there is strength in genetic and cultural unity. However, even if one prefers these as goals, how do you achieve them given both political realities and technologies such as airplanes and Skype?

FC, “diversity” as defined by the ethnic and gender studies department and as practiced by the USG is cultural unity.

Harvard Crimson editorial writer Sandra L. Korn, “a joint history of science and studies of women, gender and sexuality concentrator in Eliot House,” explains why she really shouldn’t have to put up with people offending her by voicing points of view that deviate from her leftist ideology.

She knows that after emasculating the male population for the last 20+ yrs, none of them are capable of coming to her defense, and she’ll have to go it alone.
I pity the first male gov’t agent that comes through her door.

FC, “diversity” as defined by the ethnic and gender studies department and as practiced by the USG is cultural unity.

Harvard Crimson editorial writer Sandra L. Korn, “a joint history of science and studies of women, gender and sexuality concentrator in Eliot House,” explains why she really shouldn’t have to put up with people offending her by voicing points of view that deviate from her leftist ideology.

The Doctrine of Academic Freedom
Let’s give up on academic freedom in favor of justice

Out of respect for diversity, we need to stop people from voicing unapproved thoughts.

I left this comment.

The problem is, who defines what is academically just?

I am sure some imam in Saudi Arabia issued a fatwa declaring research in support of women’s rights, gay rights, and religious freedom as “academically unjust”. He is an expert in Islamic law. Who are you to question his idea of academic justice, Miss Korn?